Howdy ya'll
GINORMOUS shout out to all of you.
Woah haha, I can't believe how much the last chapter messed with your minds XD
Let me clarify some things; Danzo is still well and truly possessed by Naruto's Smoke Demon clone. I write the name 'Danzo' as the subject whenever he is mentioned cuz it's easier for me. Plus it fucks with you guys brains. It also means my writing is getting better. It wasn't the real Naruto that made the order to kill Minato, it was Smoke Demon clone Naruto (see how long that is to write?); it would have been the same decision the real Naruto made but when Naruto found out about Minato sometime later, he also found out about something else…read to find out!
I'll also say that Kushina won't get with Minato.
Can't believe I have to say it. She's still not over Naruto and I fear she never will with how I'm portraying her, not unless I find a good pairing for her. Any opinions or should I just toss her in with Sueki (it'll be weird tho)?
Before I forget, please take note; Minato has the Hirashin seal but he isn't famous for it yet.
This chapter won't have a Kushina vs. Minato, unfortunately (sorry to disappoint) but it will have something nearly better. Can you guess what it is?
Enjoy…
CHAPTER 17
Kushina's ears twitched and her head spun to the right.
"Uncle!"
Naruto walked out from behind her, very much like he had come into existence from out of nowhere, and sent a wide eye smile to his only niece.
"Yo."
The blush that came over the boyish woman's face was akin to a dark red flower blooming, spreading out over her nose, taking over her cheeks and turning her pale ears the same shade of crimson as her hair. Kushina's knees knocked together and her hands went up to her hammering heart. The thought of him standing behind her did nothing to lessen her apparent embarrassment at being caught unaware. "W-W-Where did you come from?"
He gestured dismissively. "Around here, somewhere." He then pushed his glasses back up his nose and smile, addressing his niece and the mutely glaring man across from them. "You'll both have to forgive me for intruding on your fight," he didn't wince as an explosion from where Onion and Hiashi were battling shook the ground. He looked apologetically at the redhead. "I will be his opponent."
Her eyes enlarged and the flush reduced to just over her nose. "But, uncle-"
"I'll make it up to you." Her anger dimmed drastically, as her heart rate spiked at the proposal. "We'll go for some ramen and ice cream when we get back home, my treat." He closed his eyes and patted her head, messing up her strictly attended to straight hair. "Just like when you were a kid."
She puffed out her cheeks, defiant. "I'm…I'm not a kid."
The man gushed and brought her into his side with his right arm. "Aww, you'll always be a kid to me, Nana~"
Kushina pouted. "Not fair." Then she rounded on him, shoving her laughing uncle away. "And it's Kushina! Ku! Shi! NA!"
The masked man bopped her nose playfully. "Nana~"
The woman's hair separated into nine thick strands and she roared, her dark red face betraying any rage in her. Dark red Kyuubi chakra floated over her body and yet the bespectacled man remained near her, genially chuckling. "Yaarrghh-"
"Hey!" her enraged yell was interrupted by the festering Namikaze. "What makes you think you can interrupt me and the lady?!"
The Ghost looked at the other blonde with a deep, contemplative expression. He then walked past the Uzumaki, who was cooling down and attentively watching them.
Minato gnashed his teeth and bent back down into a fighting stance, the flirty him was long gone. "Answer me damn it!" Naruto kept on walking to him, a cool look over his face as he watched the man shroud himself with his lightning and water affinity chakra.
The masked man stopped five feet from the younger blonde and tilted his head to the side slightly, peering deep into Minato's darkened blue eyes.
He saw hate.
Resentment.
Wrath.
He saw how much Minato wanted him dead, with all his heart and soul.
Naruto's eyes quirked down fractionally, and he said. "Jiraiya lied to you, kid."
Minato's narrowed and he growled, flicking his wrists and summoning three Hirashin seals into each hand-making six-. His churning sky blue eyes stayed focused on the Ghost before him but a small part of his blazing mind wondered about the whole battlefield, excluding the parts his teammates and Kushina's teammates were fighting in. Picking the strategic places he place the seals and a blur of plans rolled through his mind to get the glasses wearing man's head rolling before he even noticed.
"I'm not your father."
"No…you're lying!"
He leaped forward, scattering two kunai in each of his hands away from his person. Lightning coursed from his body with each step and Naruto remained unmoving. His right hand led with the lethally sharp blade honed for Naruto's heart.
The Ghost, in a blaze of speed far surpassing the one pouring out of the younger blonde, snapped his right elbow up and striking Minato's attacking wrist, throwing the kunai out of the man's hand, snapped the back of his right fist across the younger man's face, which sent him tumbling into the ground, leaving a long, deep gash in the ground as his body travelled through the earth.
Kushina blinked rapidly, her senses could barely keep track of Minato's speed, not to talk of her uncle's. It seemed as if lightning had screamed down from the heavens and hit Minato square in the face, a wonder when the sky was fairly clear and was a jovial shade of sky blue, no trace of thunder clouds anywhere.
Naruto cracked his fist and started a slow trek to the Konoha ninja, who was shakily getting back to his feet from the jarring blow. The man saw the Ghost steadily approach him, cracking his fist dangerously with a grim look in his blue eyes. "I'll beat it into your head if I have to."
Minato bared his teeth and flashed away. Naruto's eyebrows lifted up, impressed that the man's presence had completely vanished from the crater before him. He turned on his heel and blocked a roundhouse kick with his left forearm, bringing the same arm down to deflect a sharp jab to his side, ripping another slap to Minato's face faster than any normal human could possibly anticipate. A trace of lightning flooded into Naruto's knee, a quick charge of his chakra to keep up with the younger man, and it tore through the air and lodged itself in Minato's abdomen.
"Ooof!" the Konoha ninja grunted and stumbled back after the savage blow, holding his throbbing stomach and coughing painfully.
Naruto observed him for a moment and said. "I don't know who your mother was…what I do know is that she was a Kemuri, a member of my clan."
"Stop talking!" the man flashed away and the Ghost cocked his head to the side, guiding a straight punch past his head and his right hand burned upwards, cracking against Minato's chin with enough force to lift him off the ground.
Minato's speed could have very well been a problem for Kushina; Naruto could even go as far as say that the man lying on his side before him was evenly matched with his second student.
The younger blonde groaned and held his chin, disappearing again.
"Tell me this, kid." Naruto said in a loud voice, casually strolling about and flicking his eyes before him. "Haven't you ever wondered…why everyone in your village hated you but Jiraiya still entrusted you to Sakumo Hatake?"
The Ghost's right hand came up and grabbed the fist aimed to tear his head off his shoulders, turned the fist over and give a spine tingling yank downwards, almost dislocating Minato's shoulder, though rendering the arm useless for the time being. He Spartan kicked the angry blonde back and slowly walked to him, as he stumbled back to his feet, holding his sore, unresponsive arm. Blood was seeped out from a corner of his mouth from the former uppercut and he gurgled. "Lies…you're…you're jus tryin' to…turn my head around."
"You're a sensor type, kid. Touch sensor, if I remember correct." Naruto said frankly, slapping away a kick to his shoulder and chopping his right hand down on Minato's only other shoulder. Questions began flooding Minato's head on how Naruto knew so much about him and his upbringing. "You've never once wondered…why Sakumo's lightning affinity chakra felt so familiar." Minato's limb arm burned with pain, from the point on his shoulder to the tips of his fingers. "My spies said that Sakumo could barely look at you, yet he couldn't throw you away…unlike when you were a baby."
"Don't…don't…"
"The sooner you accept, the sooner you can see how filthy your village is. Konoha is two-faced and corrupt." Naruto kicked down a rising knee before it could fully take off, smashing the knee down to the ground and immobilizing it. Minato's only good leg was swept back for him to fully be on his knees. "Look into it yourself," Naruto said with a smirk, knowing that the seeds of doubt had taken root in Minato's hazy brain. "I'm not completely sure why he abandoned you as a child and then accepted you into his home, into his family, later. What I do know for sure is that Jiraiya knew the truth and he intentionally told you a lie to put someone of your, admittedly, great intellect against me."
Images began playing in Minato's head and his face lowered, panting for air and wheezing in agony.
He was nine years old at the time.
"I don't want anything to do with him." Sakumo snapped under his breath. The Hatake clan head's living room was well-lit and Minato was hiding around a corner, listening to the murmured conversation between the grey haired man and his mentor, Jiraiya of the Sannin. "He is the past I want to forget."
Jiraiya didn't back down. "He is the past you have to accept, Sakumo." He jabbed the man's chest, for once in his life he was serious. "Man up and take responsibility."
"Have some respect, toad, I'm still grieving my wife!" the silent shout echoed out of the living room. "Take that…boy and get him out of my house."
"Is it because he looks like the Ghost…or because he looks like that woman?" the white haired seal master didn't bend away from the Hatake's hateful glare. "It isn't the boy's fault for being born; it is your fault for raping his mother. Accept what you did and move on!"
"Be silent, Jiraiya." The man's fists tightened and shook, turning away from his long-time friend to a picture of his late wife sitting on the fireplace.
He knew. Oh, he knew, no decent, self-respecting Dark woman would willingly lay in the same bed as a Konoha man or woman-hell, even a person from Fire country all together-willingly. Not to even talk of sleep with them. No matter how appealing the person looked or spoke, or how convincing they were on how they would definitely alleviate their suffering, make the Dark citizen enjoy being an object, the men and women did not stoop low and accepted nothing from the people of Konoha. The popular trend was to be authoritative and forceful, take what you want and don't think of the consequence. Konoha had more or less annexed Darkness at the time, so they all saw it as their right.
To the victor go the spoils.
Sakumo, in a moment of weakness, had succumbed to the encouragements of his sake.
He saw Minato's future mother clearing the table of a group of passed out Konoha ninjas, delicately nipping the dry bottles of sake and stacking the saucers on her tray. She did so with a hard look in her eyes, and she saw the indecision of whether or to slit their throats at that very moment.
Sakumo wanted her.
Badly.
She spurred his advances and his fogged up mind burned with rage.
Who did she think she was?
Did she not know of the Legend that was Sakumo Hatake, Konoha's White Fang?
"Where did you even find his surname?" he blinked, coming out from the memory of the night his life fell apart. He cast his eyes away from the picture of his beaming, late wife, shame pouring through his body in torturous waves.
Minato's jaw dropped when he heard Sakumo's voice crack. "I…I didn't mean to hurt either of them." he put his face in his hands. "I…I was just so…angry. She rejected me. Can't you understand?"
"Kemuri or not, no one deserves what you did. We were invading her home. Why would she accept you?" Jiraiya said with a frown. "You broke Kirino's heart and I will never forgive you for that. This might be your only chance to redeem yourself. I advise you to take it."
Repressed memory.
No.
He simply didn't accept that it was him they were talking about.
He told himself that there was some other boy in the house they were referring to.
He pretended that he hadn't heard the conversation that night.
Throughout his stay in the nearly vacant Hatake clan compound, Sakumo had refused to look him in the eyes.
"You were born in Dark country, that's why you're able to use Assassination Techniques, but someone, probably Sakumo, took you to Konoha. Maybe he couldn't bear looking at the physical reminder of his sins and misjudgements. He wasn't the only Konoha denizen that raped and took advantage of people from my country-"
"…Stop…talking…"
"But you were the only product of abuse that was taken away." Naruto looked down on the kneeling Konoha ninja and crossed his arms. "The cold, hard truth is that I don't see you as a problem or a threat, kid."
Minato grit his teeth and his unresponsive body trembled.
"There are at least thirty people on this continent that claim to be related to me but when I looked into them, they're not even from my clan."
A ronin from Iron country claims she was Naruto's niece.
A man from Kumo claims he was Naruto's younger brother.
Another man from Chill was claiming that he was Naruto's distant uncle.
Many, many more people were spreading their names around and using Naruto's name to elevate their status.
"When my…source in Konoha told me about you about…Uhm…thirteen years ago, I think, you were the eleventh person on that list. The only difference between you and them is that you're actually related to me and that most of them are dead, killed for sport by yours truly."
Naruto didn't have any children, and not from lack of trying. Kushina was his non-blood related niece and he raised her like he would raise his own daughter.
He saw how hard Minato was taking it.
Years and years of hating his so called 'father' and now his belief system was destabilizing, falling apart by the seams.
His mind grasped for them with all his might but they slipped through his fingers.
"I am truly sorry for how the people of your precious village treated you for looking like me. But you're not some impressionable, uninformed kid anymore; you're an adult now. Don't be spoon fed information when you can go and get it yourself. Don't simply swallow what I told you without question, not like when you were a kid and Jiraiya told you I was your father. Don't baselessly accept that Konoha was ill-treated by Darkness during the Second War. Don't vainly acknowledge that because you're a prodigy, only you can put me down, or that I need putting down. They've programmed you, Minato. Moulded and carved you with manipulation and neglect into something less human and more puppet. Open your eyes. Find out the truth on your own."
Doubt.
Doubt in his ambition.
Doubt in his ninja way.
Doubt in his whole existence.
When doubt takes hold in the heart and mind of a fanatic, especially one as strong and influential as Minato, then it would make waves through the world.
It would shake down Konoha to its foundations.
This was exactly what Naruto wanted.
Konoha's demise would come quicker this way and neither he nor his ninjas had to do much.
The questions plagued Minato's crumbling mind.
Would Jiraiya really lie to him?
Was Sakumo his real father?
Wasn't it Darkness that wronged Konoha and not the other way round?
"I'll spare your life this time, kid, but pray I don't meet you for a second time. Not even your nifty Hirashin seals would help you." He swiftly turned on his heel and waved his hand, non-verbally ordering his other ninjas to pull away. Some did so begrudgingly, abandoning their opponents in vulnerable positions. This was when more Konoha ninjas were surging towards their position. The Leader of the Dark stopped when Minato staggered to his feet, his whole weight on his right leg while his limp left leg hovered ever so slightly on the ground, his arms hung bonelessly at his sides and blood freely streamed out of his mouth. He was beaten soundly. "You want to say something?"
"I'll…" he hacked and spat away a glob of blood away from himself. "I'll kill you, Ghost. One day…I'll kill you…"
"We'll see about that."
The disappointment resonating from Minato was palpable; wasn't he a prodigy? The fight he had been patiently waiting for had come and he had failed in such a catastrophic, disgraceful way.
After all his training, why wasn't he able to even get a glancing blow on the Ghost?
Those tormenting questions swarmed him and his legs gave out from under him, and Mikoto caught him before he could hit the floor.
The Ghost was gone in a burst of smoke and the other Dark ninjas bolted away.
The Uchiha lady was badly bruised, sporting an injured cheek, slash marks littering her midsection, thankfully protected by her flak jacket, and a bad sprain on her right leg. The masked woman she had fought also came out on the other end with bad burn marks on her left arm. Mikoto looked down into the vacant eyes of the blonde man with a worried frown, her three tomoe sharingan orbs spun to a stop and deactivated. Fugaku and Hiashi converged around them, worse for wear.
"What did he do to you, Minato…?" Mikoto wondered out loud.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
"Uncle Ruto, why didn't you kill him? He's said he was going to kill you."
"'Fear the man whose belief has been put in doubt. The place he once thought was his home turned out to be a prison, the people he once learnt from and trusted turned out to be his slave masters.' From a book Jiraiya of the Sannin wrote." Naruto shook his head at the Toad sage's outstanding hypocrisy. "It's a nice book though, very interesting story. I highly recommend it."
The woman scratched the side of her head. "The hell does that even mean?"
The masked man flicked her forehead and tutted. "Language."
Kushina yelped and rubbed the bright red spot on her forehead.
The rest of the jounin team jabbered to Naruto, openly wondering what evil scheme their magnificent Leader was concocting.
"Torune didn't want me to destroy the Leaf but allow it fall on its own. I just…gave the inevitable 'fall' a small…push."
The assembled team of jounin shivered on hearing the amused chuckle of the Ghost in Glasses.
"Oh and hey, Kisame," Naruto suddenly reached to his side and a bubbling tentacle of blackness erupted out of his right arm, snagging the shark man before he was even aware and dragging the somewhat level height man to the Leader's side in a sharp crack of speed. The black smoke dispersed back into the pores on Naruto's right arm.
The bespectacled man ignored the uncertain, tense shiver that came from the wrapped bundle on the Kiri born Dark ninjas back; Samehada was unsure on whether to take a small taste out of the tantalizing bonfire of chakra and suffer the consequences later or writhe in silence, temptingly close to a small lick of Naruto's chakra. Kisame shook off the daze and reoriented himself, realizing that his esteemed Leader, the Ghost in Glasses, had his arm over his shoulder.
"When we get back home, we're gonna have a long, hard discussion about comrade safety, jeopardizing missions and proper authorization."
Kisame swallowed thickly, his blood ran cold at the devilish gleam in Naruto's sky blue eyes.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Sometime later
The Hokage's Office
The Hokage's Tower
Konoha
Fire country
Fugaku harshly pointed at the docile blonde beside him, yelling. "It is because of his incapable leadership that we all got out asses handed to us by those Dark scum! If he had conducted himself professionally, we would have swept the four of them away, got the Kyuubi and been back here in record time!"
"Enough." The Hokage said, holding up his hand for silence, but the Uchiha man wasn't finished.
"This insolent piece of animal waste was busy flirting with the Kyuubi instead of making proper plans to finish our mission! The Ghost was even there and Minato was manhandled like a child by him! So much for being a 'once-in-a-lifetime-prodigy'" he mocked the way Minato's teacher, Jiraiya, spoke of his student. "No jutsu, no seals, only hand-to-hand and his flashy Hirashin and yet he was broken with little effort. It would have been better if someone as tasteless as Hiashi was made team leader! If you had made me team leader, this disgrace would not have come on the face of Konoha and dirtied our reputation!" the ravenous man roared, now turning to the heavily, injured, silent blonde seal master. "This man has brought shame to us and the Leaf and I demand he be stripped of his hitaite and throw in prison for his ineptitude!"
Hiruzen slammed his palms on the desk and bellowed. "I said enough!"
Fugaku lowered his head and bowed on his left knee. The rest of the team, battered and wounded from the fight, were lined up in a row to his right.
They didn't speak.
They didn't come in defence of the fuinjutsu master.
"Minato." The Hokage said in a deep voice, sitting back in his seat and puffing out smoke from his nose, pulling strongly on his pipe and exhaling, calming himself down before he did something he would regret. "What do you have to say for yourself?"
Capture the Kyuubi and get information on the Entrance/Citizen seal. Those were their missions. The four of them were supposed to be the best of the best; the other ninjas they sent with the four were to act as a diversion to distract the support Kushina and Kisame had.
They anticipated the Ghost arriving and it was Minato's job to seal away his chakra, rendering him useless.
They failed and it grated on his nerves.
The Sarutobi narrowed his eyes and bit down on the end of his pipe. "Speak, boy."
"…I lost my temper when I saw the Ghost. It is unbecoming of a Konoha ninja. I offer my hitaite as punishment." He got to his feet, took off his forehead protector and offered it up to his Kage with both hands and a deep bow.
Mikoto gaped at him. "Minato!"
Wasn't being a ninja the thing he had dreamt of?
He constantly yelled it at her face each passing moment.
How could he abandon his whole life's ambition so easily?
The two other men, including Fugaku, were equally surprised.
Fugaku might have hated every single one of Minato's guts but he didn't actually want him to quit.
Hiruzen studied the bowed man before and waved his hand. "There is no need to go that far, boy. Your involvement in the war builds morale among my ninjas, for some reason." He added to himself quietly. "Keep your hitaite, but there will be consequences for your failure."
"…I take full responsibility for the team. As team leader, I didn't set a good example." Minato mechanically went back down on his knees, and hung his head, his dim, soulless eyes shaded by his wild blonde hair. "Please pardon my teammates, Lord Hokage. It is all my fault."
Mikoto grabbed his forearm and pulled, imploring him. "Minato, you don't have to do this. We're still a team." Hiashi, one his left knee and with his head somewhat tilted down, closed his eyes as Mikoto turned to him for support. Fugaku scoffed from Minato's other side and the woman, glaring hatefully at the two other men, rounded back on the blonde. "We're a team, Minato."
The fuinjutsu master didn't reply, only slowly uncurling her hand from his forearm. "What is my punishment, Lord Hokage?"
The Uchiha woman shook her head, rubbing her teary eyes with the back of her hand and cast her eyes away from the blank man to her side.
This Minato was different.
Changed.
He was vacant.
He was uncertain.
He was thinking deep.
He was quiet.
She didn't like this Minato.
'What did you do to him, Ghost?'
The Hokage hummed and leaned back, idly dragging from his pipe and breathing out black smoke from his nose.
"You will be demoted to chunin, until you prove your rank again. Then you will go to our frontlines in Frost country. You'll be staying there for a year with no pay."
The unresponsive man shrugged, but Mikoto exclaimed in muted outrage. "Sir! That is too much! It's-it's unreasonable!"
"Quiet Mikoto, be glad your team leader chose to take the blame for all of your failures."
"Sir-"
"Mikoto," Minato's said in a quiet voice, fractionally turning his bowed head and flicking his crystal blue eyes to her and giving her a tired smile. Her lips flopped down and turned down as she detected palpable vagueness in his eyes. The woman's pale face saddened at how the man had accepted his fate, apologetic for failing the mission and losing face before their Hokage. He sighed in what she could only guess was exasperation and gave her a shaky, hidden thumb up accompanied with his exhausted smile. "It's ok."
"Dismissed. Minato, come back in an hour for your deployment letter. Leave the village for Lightning by tomorrow and hand it to Commander Jishou Nara; he'll know what to do with you."
They left and Mikoto wasted no time grabbing Minato by his hand, quicker than he could flash away, and roughly dragged him, ignoring Fugaku as he asked her if she was free for dinner.
She shoved him into an alley and said. "Talk." The blonde stared at her, impassive. He then slowly tilted his head to the side, a new question in his eyes. The Uchiha placed her fists on her hips and breathed out hotly. "Why are you acting so weird?"
Minato rubbed his hand on his face and gave her a weak lopsided smile. "Just thinking about some stuff."
"What stuff? Tell me, I can help."
"I'll let you know when I've figured it out." he made to step around her but she shifted in front of him, barring him from leaving. "Mikoto…I need to go get my things ready."
"I'm not letting you leave unless you give me a straight answer."
He raised an eyebrow. "You do know that you can't keep me here." She grabbed him by his flak jacket and he sighed. "Holding me won't help either."
"Why won't you let me help you, Minato?"
His eyes looked over her head, far away and staring at nothing in particular; the streets were empty and Inuzuka ninken patrolled up and down. The people were hidden in underground bunkers. "…It's something I have to figure out for myself."
Mikoto screwed her lips to the side in distaste, then she huffed childishly. "Stupid male pride, I hate it." a flicker of a smile came to Minato's face and the Uchiha, feeling like she had somewhat succeeded, brought him in for a warm, tight hug, burying her face deep in his chest and saying in a muffled voice. "I'm here if you need me, Minato."
Minato flexed his fingers and gradually wrapped them around the shorter ninja's small frame, pressing his chin to her forehead. "Yeah, I know."
She said, her voice buzzing through his vest. "I'll go see you as many times as possible."
"Thank you."
She pinched his side and said. "In…In case I can't visit…Don't forget about me, ok?"
"I won't."
"And no flirting. T-This time I won't forgive you."
"You know I was only playing." He said in a dull voice with a laughing undertone
"Then no playing." Her fingers curled and gripped his sides with all their might, unwilling to let him go. "No talking to any girls."
"I don't remember us ever dating, Mikoto."
She pushed him away, finally realizing herself, and dusted down her flak jacket, her face masterfully devoid of feeling. "We're not; I just don't want you to give me any STD when you come back." she smirked widely when Minato rolled his eyes and walked past her back onto the side walk. "I'm serious!"
"Yeah, yeah, I hear ya."
"Want me to help you pack?"
"I'm good."
He continued his steady walk to his humble apartment and she cupped her mouth, shouting. "I'll see you off tomorrow, Minato!"
Minato waved a hand over his shoulder and was gone in a yellow flash.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
The first thing Minato did once he appeared in his apartment was to find an unused jotter and write down all the questions he wanted answered.
All four full pages of them.
He wouldn't consult Jiraiya until he had gotten a definite answer for each and every question in the book.
One of the questions, question number forty one to be exact, was concerned with the exact nature of relationship Konoha had with Darkness, the immediate next question was if it was justified of Konoha to hate Darkness.
He knew he wouldn't be able to get his answers from the library, as the library of Konoha only stocked up on books that either portrayed the village in gleaming light or enlightened children on the village's rich history through story books. He knew this because when he was a chunin, his jounin supervisor had told him so, giving him proof by personally going around with Minato and showing him that there was no book in the whole library, from as high as S rank to as basic as F rank, that even slightly shone a black light on the village. It was a secret only a few ninjas knew and Minato had been entrusted with this knowledge by none other than Orochimaru of the Sannin.
He added a note for him to speak with the secretive Sannin when he was done with his extensive investigation.
The man was known to be razor tongued and brutally honest.
Minato's research materials were limited out of the village, probably to a village or country that was neutral or non-aggressive with Darkness but no less recorded history in its library. He would pile up discoveries from various sources and make a conclusion.
Kumogakure first came to mind.
Hidden Lightning village was famously non-aggressive with Dark country.
There was a popular-and real-story that came in a few months back, that an entire battalion of Kumo ninjas-about five hundred or more in number-coming down from their village to provide support to their forces in Grass country, they encountered a small team of Dark chunin-fifty ninjas, more or less-on a retrieval mission to Waterfall. The two different shinobi groups side stepped the other, staying far away and wary but keeping their hostility to themselves. No fights were started and they went their separate ways.
This kind of situation, where Kumo and Darkness would unintentionally meet on their way for a village function, had scarcely been happening but it had been going on since long before the war.
You're an adult, find out for yourself…
Naruto's hard words ebbed through his mind, distracting him as he wrote down another question he wanted answered.
Haven't you ever wondered?
Minato gently banged his head against his work table.
I don't know who your mother was…
He grabbed his hair and tugged, a glassy look in his eyes.
I'm not your father, kid…
His breathing was becoming rapidly ragged. He banged his head harder against the solid wood table and pulled on his blonde hair, muttering to himself, pleading for silence.
Look for yourself-
"I-I need a shower." He stumbled out of his study and pushed open his bathroom door, stepping into the shower, fully clothed, and turning it on. Cold water pelted down on him as he rattled down how he was going to murder the Ghost if all this paranoia was for nothing.
When he was a child, he had accepted Jiraiya's words without question because his universal truth at that time was that someone of Jiraiya's status, a Legendary Sannin and a Toad Sage, would have reason to lie to a useless little speck of humanity like him.
He was nothing special and the most amazing man picked him out of the gutter and gave him a life.
There wasn't a reason for Jiraiya to lie to him. There shouldn't be a reason.
He didn't want to think of what he would do to Konoha if he found out the truth.
Konoha, the village that stood at the pinnacle of human civilization and the single greatest place on earth.
He believed with all his whole heart that whatever Konoha did, even if it looked bad or evil, it was all for the better. Konoha could do no wrong.
Right?
Jiraiya hadn't lied to him.
Right?
He didn't have wool over his eyes.
Right?
No…he didn't want to think of what he would do to Konoha if he found out the truth…
Amidst his mental breakdown, Minato was well past caring if his growing doubt was selfish.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
The Next Day
Konoha's Advance Unit
Tsumetai Valley
Frost country
Frost country was a technological village, much like their Kumogakure neighbour, though their development was more muted and focused on how best they could best survive the daily cold. The country was also where Kumo hired engineers and mechanics to build their own tech and stored a good portion of their village funds in the Frost Bank for emergencies.
It was unarguably a Kumo stronghold.
Hitting the country would stunt Kumo's ability to fund the war.
The problem was that, as the name of their country implied, the territory was constantly under thick snow and below freezing. Ninjas of the village were well adept in in the ways of the cold better than any invader.
Frost still remained an important target spot to cripple Hidden Lightning and its allies, swerving the war in favour Hidden Leaf and its allies.
Even after three years, the war in that region was not confrontational but fought with traps and guerrilla attacks. The snow and the cold was a factor that hindered the Leaf's Advance Unit and this slow progress into the Kumo stronghold.
Geographically, Frost was difficult to get to because there were only two ways to the cold country; by sea or through Kumo. The country was rich, very much so, and Kumo's was allied to it through trade and civilian relations. At the beginning of the war, Hidden Lightning village extended this alliance to include military because of the wide spread investments they had made in Frost country-or in Hidden Chill village-. Konoha's plan was to remove Kumo influence and claim Chill resources as their own, though due to the near inaccessibility of the far northern country the Advance Unit there was almost forgotten.
The Leaf had forgotten that it was from the Advance Unit in Frost country that they had been able to get the equipment to jam radio of enemy ninjas.
Commander Jishou Nara was a reedy man that did not fit the build of a tough and rugged war veteran that had been fighting against Kumo and Chill-Frost-allied forces for three years straight. He had gelled black hair and dark brown eyes that had medicated contact lenses over them of the same colour. He was in the ordinary, standard jounin uniform though he had on thick white and light grey furs over his form to both act as camouflage and to ward of the soul freezing cold wailing outside of the tent.
The man eyed Minato with a hard frown as the blonde man collapsed onto his knees, the tips of his fingers were light blue and his thick parka was frozen stiff from the blizzard he had to tread through to get to the valley. The cold wind and snow blew over the valley but that didn't mean they were spared from a somewhat watered down version of the frigid temperature.
The seal master wiggled his fingers and rubbed his hands together, trying to get feeling into his numb hands and painfully shuffling to the waiting man, presenting him with the scroll the Sandaime had written to be given to the commanding officer of the advance camp.
Some other officers and ninjas were present in the barely warm tent, looking down on the shivering blonde, who had not known such cold in his whole life, not even during Konoha's winter when he was forced to sleep outside of the orphanage.
The Nara scoffed as he read the scroll, rolling a cigarette in his lips.
"So you're the hot shot that got demoted huh."
Minato pushed himself into a straight position and saluted. "Chunin Namikaze, reporting."
Jishou smirked, a harsh expression on his face, and he looked about to his other subordinates who had reflective looks in their eyes. "I remember you…he's the Ghost boy." Minato gnashed his teeth but clamped his mouth shut; Jishou chuckled deeply and continued reading. "Smart. Know when to shut the hell up. If you do that, you may just live a bit longer here."
The blonde nodded solemnly, rolling chakra through his body to find even the slightest bit of warmth.
Commander Jishou rolled up the scroll and said. "My name is Jishou Nara; I am the Commander of this Advance Unit." He gave Minato a degrading look. "Do you know what an Advance Unit is?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well."
"An Advance Unit is a group of selected soldiers that are to clear the path for the main force. Dismantle traps, set up counter-traps against inhabitants and build a functioning communication tower."
"Right you are. This is the Forgotten Fort, Ghost boy." They were severely underfunded and terribly low on able bodied ninjas. "I have been in Frost for three years and Lord Sandaime has focused ninety six percent of the war away from here." He threw the scroll at Minato and spat. "Now, he sends only you here after eight months. One man." Minato wisely stayed silent. Jishou rubbed his temple and motioned for the letter back, opening it and saying. "Do you know what Lord Sandaime said in this?"
Minato shook his head.
"'Put him through hell.'"
The seal master controlled his face so as not to show the resentment he had welling inside him.
Jishou pushed the scroll into his pocket, saying. "That is physically and mentally impossible, Ghost boy, and if you read about this advance camp before coming you'd know why."
The Forgotten Fort was hell.
Jishou turned to the table, where the map of Frost country lay out, spotted with red and green markers where ninjas of the country had set traps-red-and where Konoha had placed traps-green-. The green markers were slightly more than the red. He said over his shoulder.
"Shake off that cold, Ghost boy, we move out in ten."
Authors note
And now, for a side story. Kushina is twelve here.
Side story
Dark-Lightning Unofficial Neutrality Agreement
The bell for the second to the last period rang and their teacher excused herself from the class to go and bring an important prop for their next class.
Shinobi History.
Students of the Dark country Ninja Academy, Class 3B, erupted into murmured conversation, some leaving their desks and going over to sit by their friends, making idle chatter as their teacher went to the staff room.
Kushina boredly balanced a pencil on her nose.
One of her two close friends huffed and leapt onto the Uzumaki's desk. The girl was in a red and white track suit, red converse and her frizzy blonde hair was tied up in a messy bun, not hindering the one inch long pair of horns protruding from the top of her head. There was a roaring black bear stamped on the back of her track suit jacket and the Dark country insignia on her right chest. She had the sleeves of her track suit rolled up and her arms tapped her knee impatiently, wondering when Kushina would notice she was there.
"Hey." Kushina flicked her head back, tossing the pencil into the air and catching it in her left hand. Kushina's other friend, a boy wearing an obnoxiously green superhero cape and boots, turned to the left in his seat, facing her. "What'd I do?"
"Did you forget today's your birthday?"
The redhead scoffed. "Of course not, my uncle said he was gonna pick me up."
The girl, Shimara Kuma, quirked up an eyebrow. "For the barbecue, right?"
Kushina rolled her eyes. "Auntie Su knows you're coming, there'll be lots of meat."
The bear girl licked her lips and patted her tummy, eagerly waiting for when she would stuff herself full with roasted meat.
The girl was from a branch of the Chui-Inku called the Kuma (bear) family. The small family upheld the clan's fuinjutsu roots though their method of taijutsu training differed from the rest of the class; where the general clan practised forms of ballet dancing to hone their fighting styles, the Kuma family practised boxing. The Kuma family was presently almost exclusively members of BLAK, with members like Panda, Polar Bear, Koala, Black Bear hinted to be among the elite shinobi of the country, though their identities remained unknown and the members of the family respectfully didn't pry.
Shimara aimed to be in BLAK.
It was her dream.
The Kuma family was also the only remaining branch of the Chui-Inku clan. Their branch counterpart within the clan, the Sakenomi family-or blood drinker family-, of which Sueki was the last remaining member, had been wiped out.
The physical features of the Kuma family was not that much different from the rest of the ink clan, as they too bore horns and contributed in their own way to the artistic heritage of the clan, the difference being that they had large appetites and their preferred food was meat-or fish-, whilst that of the rest of the clan kept a more balanced diet.
Branch families of larger clans were not an oddity, seeing as they were merely a small section of a bigger group of people. Unlike what they had heard from Konoha, where Branch Hyuuga were limited by cage seals by the Main family, the branch families of clans in Darkness were not that different from everyone else. The only other clan that had a branch family was the Suzumebachi clan, who had the Shiroari (termite) family. The branch family were in tune with their termite colonies and thus used them, instead of using wasps like the rest of the clan.
The boy in the ridiculous superhero getup was the only child of a rich and affluent real estate broker in River country that was dipping his fingers in Dark country's brimming tech company. The boy's father was one of the financers of the company, though still owning a tiny fraction.
The boy's name was Ran Tomo but he preferred to be called Epic Mist.
Epic Mist suggested. "You didn't invite us, so…we were just wondering…"
The red haired girl palmed her face. "We've known each other for three years, guys. Do I actually have to tell you you're invited to my birthday party?"
"It'll help. I always tell you you're invited to come to my birthday parties." The bear girl said, pointing her thumb to herself, offended.
Yumi Nakamura, the class teacher, walked back into the room with a map and a stand under her arm.
"Alright class, settle down." She smiled thankfully to the class prefect as he came up to her to help her set up the stand. She placed the map of the continent on the stand for the whole class to see and handed the prefect a small stack of papers to share to the class. As he was going up and down the aisles, ushering his classmates back into their seats and placing the papers before them, Yumi clapped her hands and began the class. "Today we will be talking about the end of the Second Shinobi War, emphasizing on a major event that was the catalyst for Kumo and Iwa withdrawing from Ameagakure."
The class rustled as they brought out their history textbooks and notebooks, flipping to the page their teacher was talking about and peering into the pieces of paper laid by their class prefect, which was a photocopy of a text from a different history book.
Above the text was a grainy image of who they recognized as their Leader, Naruto, standing in a fighting position two or so feet away from the current Raikage, Cee.
Kushina's eyebrows shot into her hairlines, tracing the young and serious face of her uncle with her pencil, captivated by the determination in his glowing white energy eyes.
"That single event is called Lightning vs. Lightning. In some other history books, usually the ones outside of Darkness and unallied nations, this event is blotted out as insignificant." Some attentive students scribbled down in their notebooks and others underlined a version of what the teacher said in their history textbooks, on how Lightning vs. Lightning wasn't a main factor that drew the Second war to a close. "The battle itself is minor compared to the results but if it had not taken place, the war would have lasted much, much longer."
The discussion wasn't about raising the students perception of their glorious Leader but on the accepting the truth.
If Lightning vs. Lightning didn't happen, then the Second War could still have been raging on strong.
Nakamura-sensei enlightened them on this point, skimming over the actual fight and talking of the mutual respect both Masters of the Lightning release had gotten for the other that had broached over to their informal, unwritten neutrality agreement between Kumo and Dark country.
Stay out of my business and I'll stay out of yours, was what it basically entailed.
The bell rang and the students flooded out of the classroom, bearing a whole new understanding on why so many people, among the allies of their country and of those not allied, had so much respect for their Leader.
Kushina unconsciously shrugged on her bag and made small talk with her friends as she left the school doors, casually walking to the gates.
A short distance from the entrance doors, Naruto raised his hand and waved; the Uzumaki girl visibly brightened as she saw him and ran to him full tilt, slamming into him with a hug.
Naruto chuckled and patted her head. "Did you have a good day in school?"
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, we learnt Campfire jutsu and-and Yumi Nakamura-sensei taught us how to set a bear trap."
Naruto's eyes curved up in a kind smile. "Sounds like fun." His eyes went up as he saw Shimara and Ran jogging over to them. "I spoke with your parents; they said its fine if I take you home. You'll meet up with us at Kushina's birthday barbecue." The little girl cheered, much to Naruto's amusement. They bobbed their heads and Naruto then looked sceptically at them. "She did invite you two, right?" and the two friends bowed respectfully to Naruto.
Shimara shot out. "No, Lord Naruto."
"Uncle, she's lying! Don't believe her!" Kushina said quickly, very much alarmed, she flapped her hands in hope that the issue would blow over.
"It's true, sir." Epic Mist added his voice.
Kushina whipped her head to him. "Traitor."
"Don't mind her; Kushina's always gets awkward when it comes to her birthday." The girl then turned to her uncle, betrayed. "Oh, don't give me that look." The girl silently puffed out her cheeks and crossed her arms. "Alright, fine I'll…I don't know…teach you an extra cool rope binding trick during training."
"...ok."
Kushina took his hand into her own, her own being utterly engulfed by his as she trotted beside him. Naruto made sure to stride in an easy pace.
This was a completely different Kushina than the one they knew in school.
The tomboyish girl they knew would sooner use her teeth to tear off the head of any poor idiot that treated her like a child, now they were seeing how the girl flushed, blushed and gushed like a true school girl before her idol, yammering his ear off in what they could make out as partly incomprehensible stuttering
Since the girl had reconciled with Kisame and news got out that her last, great prank almost permanently crippled the shark boy, people had been deferring to her fearfully, more so than in her previous years.
The bear girl and the superhero wannabe had seen this side of her many times, but it still felt strange seeing Kushina visibly preen under her crush's serene, sky blue gaze.
Kushina skipping was something they still weren't used to seeing, for this was the second time they'd seen it happen and it was always when she was going home with the country's Leader.
The Uzumaki noticed Naruto was in his white and black Leader's robe, garnering a fair bit of attention from the parents and students, who bowed hastily and sent greetings to him. Her cheeks coloured as she held his hand, bouncing next to him. "A-Are you just coming back from work?"
"Yup, there wasn't much for me to do." Not with how his two Office Assistants sifted through his files and handed him the ones he needed to attend to personally. "I decided to come here right away. Your Auntie Su is getting the fire started back home." The man's eyes twinkled when he saw the Kuma girl smack her lips. "There will be meat aplenty."
Kushina pouted, not liking how her uncle's attention wasn't solely on her. "Hey, Uncle, Nakamura-sensei taught us about Lightning vs. Lightning during last period Shinobi History."
"Is that so? What did she say?"
"That you were super cool and beat the snot out of the Raikage. Dattebane!" The girl punched forward and made a wild kick. The Leader laughed and scratched the back of his head.
"It's…a bit more complicated than that."
"Lord Naruto, sir." Epic Mist hesitantly said and Naruto looked over to him, a look that immediately put the nervous boy at ease. "Nakamura-sensei didn't much about the fight."
Naruto furrowed his eyebrows. "The fight itself isn't important; it's the result of the fight that matters."
"But, sir," Epic Mist interjected politely, not wanting to push his Leader's patience. "We want to hear about the fight."
"Eh…"
Bear girl nodded. "Please, Lord Naruto."
"You all want to hear it?" the three twelve year olds bobbed their heads as one. They were now leaving the schools massive gates and were making a slow, casual trek through the countryside, back to the main capital. Carriages that ambled down the road stopped by and asked if their Leader and his wards needed a lift but Naruto courteously declined. The weather was just right for a nice walk and a story anyway. "Alright…"
Naruto cleared his throat.
"It was a warm autumn morning…"
Ameagakure was celebrating a week or so of the death of Hanzo the Salamander, though they were still plagued by the presence of foreign shinobi in their country.
The Akatsuki had kicked out most of Konoha's forces from their country, as the Leaf village was the red cloud organization's primary target for their disdain for a good period of time, but there were still Iwa and Kumo ninjas in Rain. Iron country samurai had long since retreated back to their home country as soon as Hanzo had been killed by the man with the eyes of a god.
The upper brass of the Akatsuki were running low on energy, still recuperating from the events leading up to and after the death of Hanzo, but one of the members rose up and forcefully flowed chakra through his body, regenerating and refilling his chakra reserves faster than natural with a ninja technique not all people with the same bloodline as him knew of or could do.
This technique was painful.
This technique was unique to only him.
This technique was called Hiden art: Lightning release: Copper Coil Restoration.
The Ghost would continuously strike the seven main tenketsu on his body with what little lightning chakra he had, and within thirty minutes of that painful exercise he would be at full tank again, though his lightning would dominate his water affinity chakra more than normal, limiting how much smoke he could create from his body.
The Amekage sent him out of the Tower to massacre a wave of Kumo ninjas approaching their country but instead, the Ghost ran full tilt and tackled the Raikage, taking him deep through the forest, out of the cluster of trees and into a field of waist length grass outside of Ame.
The soldiers prioritized locating their disappeared Kage over the invasion, so they withdrew.
Meanwhile…
"You've got some nerve, Ghost." Cee grumbled, wiping the side of his mouth with the back of his hand, gritting his teeth. His outstanding abs popped, casting aside the throb from when the seventeen year old had tackled him, his back also cracked, ridding himself of the pain of it meeting and breaking an uncountable number of trees. "Took me by surprise back there."
The blonde teen adjusted the beastly, grinning half mask on his face and dusted down his Akatsuki robes. "That was the plan."
"You're as fast as they say." The white bearded Raikage closed his fists and they cracked, eliciting a rumble of thunder through the sky. Black clouds began gathering over the pair, who narrowed their eyes, barely even blinking, and rumbling with stored up lightning chakra. "What's the plan now? You want to kill me?"
"If I wanted to kill you…I would have done that back in Rain."
Cee raised an eyebrow. "Then?"
"If I beat you…you must withdraw your forces from Ame."
The man bellowed out a laugh. "That, Ghost, will be impossible for even you right now. You've lost the element of surprise."
"Do you agree or not?" Naruto grunted.
"I'll do you one better, if you win I withdraw my forces and convince Oonoki to take Iwa out of Ame. But if I win, you return with me to Kumo and we breed the ever living hell out of you."
Naruto hummed. "That…doesn't sound so bad."
The dark skinned man grinned cheekily, scratching the side of his face. "I know, right?"
"By breeding you mean…"
"I mean you'll get any woman you want at any time."
The Ghost scratched his chin, considering the offer. "With that offer, I'll be tempted to not fight at all." the assassin then rolled his neck and hunched his shoulders. "But I'll have to pass, Ame is much more important."
Cee looked at Naruto strangely. "Are-Are you crying?"
"Fight me, damn it!"
Cee studied the silently weeping young man, who hid his teary eyes under the shade of his shaggy yellow hair. "…Out of respect, I shall not hold back." the white haired man slammed his fists together and said in a deep voice. "Lightning Armour."
Electricity lit up the Raikage and his white hair stood on end, as he bent down and took a deathly focused fighting stance.
The Ghost crouched down onto the ground and held up a half dragon hand seal to his chest. "White Noise."
The black clouds directly above the blonde rumbled and white lightning threaded through at blazing speed. The lightning then suddenly arced down and smashed the nape of the Ghost's neck, coursing through the assassin's body. The only physical change was that his cerulean eyes turned sharp white and that a network of veins pulsing with white energy spread out on the sides of his face, coming from his eyes and reaching his ears.
Naruto released the half dragon seal and the sky thundered deafly.
Cee, keeping his fists together, studied the tight crouching position of the infamous assassin. Lightning curled and crossed over him.
Then Naruto leaped forward, his arms flying behind him and his head lowered in concentration. Thin, wraith-like afterimages poured out from behind him with each step, crossing the field to his opponent at what looked like an average jounin speed.
Cee raised an eyebrow, wondering how the Ghost could be running that slow-mid-jounin speed was slow for a speedster like him-and yet still have afterimages-
Then, as Naruto got ten feet from him, his senses went wild and he dragged his head back. A right hook clipped against his jaw from an opponent he scarcely saw; what he did see was a pair of blazing white orbs hovering in the air and the faint outline of a humanoid looking creature.
The solid, fully coloured Naruto finally reached him, his fist shooting through the air for a right hook.
'What the hell…?' Cee asked himself bewildered, flipping backwards as a jagged bolt of lightning screamed down from the sky, scorching the grass and burning off a patch of the soil underneath.
The ghostly apparition followed him and he grit his teeth, blocking his chest with his forearms as a rising knee threatened to open a hole in his chest.
Cee slapped down a jab to his chin, side stepped a roundhouse kick, batted back a knee to his side and his left elbow roared with lightning, ripping a hole through the air as it travelled towards what he hoped was his opponent. The elbow passed above the wraith's face and the white eyes narrowed, skipping to the right and returning with his own elbow. Cee covered his face with his forearms and closed his eyes tightly as lightning from the thunder clouds blasted down and hit him square on the top of his head, just as he managed to blow the misty, semi-unseen elbow from the Ghost before him.
The fully coloured Naruto went through those motions, including avoiding the retaliatory elbow from the Raikage.
From an outsider's point of view, the fight looked like two opposing arcs of lightning flitting and blazing across the battleground, ripping the ground apart and setting fire to foliage. Each strike, counter or block was accompanied by a bolt of lightning from the sky and a ground shuddering roll of thunder. The battle would be blinding to actually watch and any sequence of attacks, not matter how long, actually took place within two seconds for both combatants.
For them, peering outside, it was as if the whole world was frozen.
Naruto, under his personalized White Noise technique, was moving at half a second faster than the speed of sound. Every inch of his body was coated with his volatile chakra, specifically his lightning chakra, and this effect temporarily (and harmlessly) dissolved all of his skin, raising him up a few dozen notches on a scale of speed. Surprisingly enough, this form was a single step lower than Naruto's Silent Night.
The only way the Raikage could follow any sort of movement from the phantom was through instinct and shinobi intuition, though just barely.
The man's lightning armour carried him on a speed that seldom, if ever, had his feet touch the ground and this was to his benefit, as from what he could see, Naruto still tread on the ground, even with his speed. The full colour Naruto was merely a few seconds behind the fight, though his presence still bewildered and confused the dark skinned Kage.
This was a battle of speed and creativity, and the Raikage would be lying if he said he wasn't impressed by what he was seeing.
An excited grin cracked on the white bearded man's face, just as an uppercut rattled his brain in his skull and, as his feet left the ground, his own knee cracked against the Ghost's nose, breaking it.
Cee used the momentum from the dizzying attack to flip backwards onto his feet, his eyes immediately searched for the unseen Ghost he had been battling for who knows how long. On the other side of the field, the Ghost grabbed his nose and harshly jerked his hand to the side, forcefully setting his nose back in place with a small wince. The apparition pelted down to the Kage, who seemed to still be looking for him, and Ghost's hands threaded together, flashing through fifty seals at once.
White lightning flashed down from the sky, approximately eight metres from the Raikage, and then it bent and shot to him.
Cee pivoted on his left heel, slamming his foot against the dangerously honing bolt of white lightning and muttered. "Lightning Shield."
Naruto finished his set, ending the seals with a ram and holding it under his lips. "Fire release: Mortal Flame Sickness." His chakra rattled over his form and the Ghost exhaled over his laced fingers. The fully coloured Naruto and the afterimages behind it all dispersed and rushed to the real phantom, passing through Naruto's back and exiting the Ghost's maw as a burning human being, wailing and clambering at impossible speed to the alarmed, though still professional, Raikage.
The burning human being leaped to Cee, its arms and legs spread open and its pained screaming shaking the dark skinned man to his core. Cee clapped his hands together and burned through two seals. "Lightning release: Electric Dagger."
A dagger of lightning exited from the man's armour and cut straight through the flame zombie, who exploded on contact.
Cee rolled around on his feet and a knee cut through the air, ready to tear off Naruto's head for the distraction, but the semi-visible assassin skidded on his knees under the deadly attack, rolled forward as the Raikage called down a sharp arc of lightning from the sky to smash into him, barely missing the Ghost.
CRACK!
Cee called down twenty more red tipped bolts of electricity from the black clouds rumbling high above them, pointing them on where his senses informed him the evading ninja was running. He turned around in a full circle as jagged bolt after jagged bolt of lightning screamed and exploded in the ground, destroying the battlefield all the more.
C-C-CRRA-CR-CRRRAAACK!
The apparition he had been doggedly targeting suddenly stopped and flounced around a bolt of lightning, and pointed his hand at the Raikage, who was sending five more of his attacks down from the heavens to his opponent. Naruto's fingers closed, his thumb, pointer and middle finger protruded.
"Lightning release: Sleep Paralysis."
The Kage saw the shots of white lightning coming for him and he thrust his chest out, brazenly deflecting the paralysing attacks with his broad chest, wearing a wide, maniacal grin on his face. The lightning armour shrouded over the Kage clattered against the shots from the apparition and clanged off him somewhere else.
The Ghost stood his ground and fire off more shots, squeezing more and more of his potent lightning chakra out of select tenketsu from the tips of his pointer and middle finger. The Raikage bellowed out a boisterous laugh with each deflection until the very last shot. The Ghost hitchhiked on his jutsu and appeared before the shocked Kage, mid-laugh. Naruto swept around the Raikage and pushed his palms forward, striking his palms against the back and side of the dark skinned man.
Palm strike after palm strike, harmlessly glancing off the crackling body armour, until the Kage felt a chill run through him as the humanoid creature attacking him with unfathomable speed grinned.
A wide, devilish grin that showed Naruto's gleaming white, serrated teeth.
Cee looked down and his eyes widened.
Explosive tags.
Custom explosive tags.
Ones that steadfastly stuck to his lightning armour and promptly fizzled on once set.
Cee smirked darkly. "You're fuckin' crazy, Ghos-"
The Ghost, tittering out a demented laugh, raised his hands and snapped his fingers, long before the dark skinned Kage could finish his statement. "Katsu."
The resulting explosion zeroed in their position and Kumo ninjas hurriedly ran over, pushing their noses in the crook of their elbows as black smoke washed past them.
Hot wind blasted out from the centre of the blast.
They wisely stayed back on the outskirts of the fight zone, gaping at the state of their Kage; his white jounin flak jacket was burned beyond recognition, showing his thundering chest and abs, his pants were frayed on the end and the ends of his white beard was singed from the heat. Standing before him, hunched over and panting through grit teeth and churning white orbs, was the infamous Ghost, who's red and black cloud cloak had lost its sleeves to the heat and whose broken nose freely pulsed with blood. Naruto had his hands drawn close to him, guarding his chin and his chest, standing about two feet from the Kage of Kumo.
Cee, also out of breath and valiantly hiding it, maintained eye contact with his corporal opponent.
"You're lucky I don't want you dead, man." Naruto said, breathing out smoke from his open, though hidden maw. "I could have left the bombs to incinerate you."
On the very last second before catastrophe hit, he had covered the man and himself with the little smoke he could muster, but not fast enough to save Cee's flak jacket or the ends of his pants.
The man patted down his nearly burnt, white beard and chuckled.
"It's my loss."
Naruto dropped his defensively raised fists and sighed heavily. "Good, awesome." He rubbed his broken nose tenderly and winced again, already hearing his student scold his recklessness.
"I'll order my medics to fix your nose."
"Don't worry about it." Naruto waved him off, holding his nose with his left and waving off the offer carelessly with his right. He then pointed out. "Just…don't forget our deal."
The man smirked lightly and held up his right fist. "Hai, all my ninjas will be out of Kumo in half an hour and I will have Oonoki do the same soon."
Naruto looked at the offered hand tentatively, then he bumped the fist with his right fist. "Good fight, old man."
The Kumo ninjas visibly saw the respect both legendary shinobi had for each other in the small gesture.
The Raikage laughed loudly. "Please, old man was my father's name, call me Cee."
"Gotcha, call me Naruto." The Ghost then felt a rush of tiredness hit him and he groaned. The jutsu he had used to force up the flow of lightning chakra in his chakra network called to him, reminding him that he could get himself back to full tank and heal his nose with his body's natural regeneration, but he shook off the thought; this time, he wanted his energy to come back on its own to balance out his chakra network, so that he would be able to be able to fully use his Smoke release. He exhaled from his nose, as his battered nose was too clogged with blood for much use for that moment, and he said. "Well…have a nice life, Cee." He tiredly limped past the laughing Kage and mumbled to himself. "I really need a nap. I'm so fuckin' tired."
The Kumo ninjas on the edge of the battle zone silently stood aside, parting down the middle in an unvoiced show of respect, allowing the Ghost as he leisurely hobbled back to Ame…
"…And the Raikage was as good as his word; he withdrew from Ame, strong armed the Tsuchikage to do the same, I'm not sure how but I'm not questioning his methods. Smaller countries and hidden villages heard that those two Great Ninja Villages left Ame and took their forces out of other nations back to Kumo and Iwa, and they followed suit and went back to their homes. Konoha didn't see anyone left to fight so they too left, their allies as well. The conflict subsided gradually and eventually the war ended."
He looked down to the three children.
"The end."
"Dattebane!"
"Amazing!"
"Cool!"
Naruto smiled gently and Kushina swing his hand as she skipped next to him. "I'm glad you liked that story." Of course he omitted some parts, like the Raikage swearing or him considering the breeding option. He pointed forward and said. "We're almost home."
End of side story
Thus ends the chapter.
Drop a review on your thoughts, would you so kindly. Please stay safe, wherever you are in the world, and I will see you when I see you.
Foy.